Leadership dispute intensifies in Egypt

Manu Brabo, APEgyptian protesters hold a poster depicting justice being silenced by presidential candidate Ahmed Shafiq and blinded by a military general in Tahrir Square in Cairo, Egypt, on Friday.

CAIRO -- A showdown between the Muslim Brotherhood and Egypt's ruling military council escalated Friday, as the generals blamed the Islamist organization for stoking public tensions by prematurely asserting victory in last week's presidential election and the Islamist candidate said a national front was forming to defy military moves to consolidate power.

The dueling statements were delivered as tens of thousands of Egyptians swarmed into Cairo's Tahrir Square for a Brotherhood-led protest against those moves, which include a recent constitutional decree giving the armed forces vast authority and enfeebling the future president. As the crowd swelled, the generals issued a statement defending the decree as being in the nation's "interest" and vowing swift and firm action against those who fueled unrest.

Egypt's presidential election commission had been expected to announce the winner in the presidential election runoff on Thursday, but the proclamation was postponed. Mohamed Morsi, the Brotherhood's candidate, has claimed victory and provided precinct tally reports as evidence. His rival, Ahmed Shafiq, widely presumed to be the military's candidate, has also said he won the election but has not offered evidence.

Friday's military statement called the announcement of unofficial results "unjustified" and "one of the main reasons behind the prevailing division and confusion in the political arena."

Concern was growing here that the competing claims and the military's seeming reluctance to transfer power to an elected president could set the stage for a violent confrontation. The military recently gave its officers the right to detain civilians without criminally charging them.

Hours after the military statement, Morsi appeared at a news conference with a host of Brotherhood stalwarts and public intellectuals and youth leaders viewed as secular. He said he would await the final results -- which election officials say will be released once they have reviewed complaints about irregularities -- but his supporters made clear they believed Morsi was the legitimate victor.

In a strident but diplomatically worded speech, Morsi appeared to rebuke the military council, for its recent moves to expand its powers and its warnings against peaceful protests, and to dampen persistent speculation that the Brotherhood is brokering a deal with the generals behind closed doors.

"The constitutional declaration clearly implies attempts by the military council to restrict the incoming president," he said, at times drawing applause from the Egyptian press corps. "This we totally reject."

Morsi said the Brotherhood had been meeting for two days with a range of political activists and intellectuals who had agreed to join forces in support of a smooth transfer of power.

But he also appeared disinclined to provoke the military, and he ended his statement with conciliatory words for the ruling generals.

"They are honest men working for the betterment of Egypt," Morsi said. "They are working to safeguard our land."

As he has done in the past, Morsi sought to reassure those skeptical about an Islamist president, saying he would form a broad-based cabinet led by an independent prime minister and including women and Christians.

He did not say whether he or other Brotherhood leaders had been in discussions with the military, but he insisted there would be no compromise on the demand to overturn the military decree. In an interview Wednesday, Brotherhood spokesman Mahmoud Ghozlan denied such meetings were taking place.

"We are not bartering between security and democracy, between security and freedom," said Wael Ghonim, a former Google executive and secular activist in last year's revolution, who stood with Morsi on Friday.

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